But enough.
Now he’d put out this little fire of her intended desertion he needed to refocus on his father. Specifically ensuring Pueblo didn’t come out the victor in their battle to win Lavinia Archer’s business.
Dark anticipation twisted with bitterness in Joao’s gut. These days the man who’d fathered him might still call himself a billionaire but Joao’s was the Oliviera name people uttered in deference and awe. It was he world leaders turned to for business and geo-political counsel.
Joao knew it stuck in Pueblo’s craw that the bastard son he’d cursed to damnation, the product of a drunken indulgence with a prostitute one wholly forgettable night, had become a man of untold power and means. It was a status his father was desperate to overturn.
In turn, Joao intended to devote his time and effort to maintaining his superior position. To do that he needed his sharpest players, including his right hand, in their rightful place.
So he reined himself in but not before he went to his desk, picked up her resignation letter and ripped it in two.
‘You may take this with you.’ He held it out to her, watched her retrace her steps to where he stood next to his desk.
The sway of her hips reminded him that he hadn’t indulged himself for several weeks. Not since Morocco. Not since that night he’d celebrated his victory over his father with a tumble into temptation and awoken to learn of Pueblo’s interest in the Archer Group.
And he wouldn’t indulge himself for a while yet. Not if he didn’t want to lose his way and lose this fight. He knew first-hand what chaos unbridled lust could create.
He had no intention of falling into that trap again.
With enviable composure, Saffie took the ripped page from him. ‘If that’s all, I’d like to go and get on with the day?’
‘By all means,’ he murmured.
He watched her walk briskly out of his office, feeling as if he’d freshly emerged from an industrial-sized centrifuge.
Sure, some of the spur-of-the-moment deals he’d capitalised on had been the best of his life...but had any of them left him reeling like this?
And all over his assistant wishing to jump ship?
Growing up in abject poverty, seeing the lengths to which people would go to step over one another for the sake of putting food in their belly or dragging themselves out of the gutter, had triggered a fierce opposition against fathering a child. That had been long before his double rejection from both parents. That had merely cemented what he already knew. Família was a foolish illusion people wrapped themselves up in until the going got tough, then they were all too quick to throw off its burdens and disavow themselves from their responsibilities. As for that other worthless notion of familial love—?
The ringing of his silver phone shattered his bitter thoughts, and, with more than a little relief, he strode to his desk and snatched it up.
‘Joao Oliviera,’ he announced himself with the power and authority that was second nature to him these days. Within minutes he’d returned to his natural habitat of proficient mogul with his eyes on the next challenging prize.
It was almost as if the last hour hadn’t happened.
Except that it had.
Again, that noxious mix of imbalance and uncertainty welled inside him. It was an upsurge of memories of his past that was causing his disgruntlement, he concluded. And like every adversity, he’d conquer these, too.
With that firm assurance, he threw himself fully into his day.
When Saffie knocked and entered a few hours later, she too had returned to her rightful business mode. She was thoroughly up to speed with what his investigators had unearthed about Lavinia and put forward cogent ideas that perfectly augmented his own plans for the heiress.
By Wednesday morning the scene was set to step up the campaign to win over Lavinia Archer.
Joao had every intention of getting her to board the private jet he’d sent for her in South Africa. By midday he had his confirmation that she was on her way.
All it’d taken was a simple yet brilliant idea from Saffron to send her a gold-embossed envelope containing nothing but the name of the renowned auction house in Shanghai.
For a jaded heiress like Lavinia Archer, the bait had been too much to resist.
It was a coup worth celebrating. He would have if his mood had improved since Monday. It hadn’t.
So it was also a good thing Saffie had been out of the office at his stylist readying herself for their extended trip to Shanghai. For the last thirty-six hours he hadn’t been able to glance at her without the aggravating reminder that she’d intended to walk away.
As a reminder to her of just how much she loved this job she’d been so eager to throw away, he’d set her endless tasks, at which she’d excelled. And yes, along the line, he’d been filled with a deep desire to watch her bone-deep composure crack.